Andarta

Andarta was a Celtic goddess worshiped in southern Gaul. Inscriptions invoking her name have been found in and around modern Die, within the territory of the Vocontii in Southern France.

Name

The Gaulish theonym Andarta is traditionally derived from the Gaulish word for 'bear', artio, attached to an intensifying prefix and-. On this basis, the name has been interpreted as 'big she-bear' or 'mighty she-bear', or as Ursa Major. Blanca María Prósper finds this interpretation unconvincing on semantic and syntactic grounds, and instead interprets the name as 'Well-fixed' or 'Staying-firm', from a Proto-Indo-European prefix *h₂ndʰi- (or *h₁ndo-) combined with the participial element *-h₂-rtó ('fixed, composed, built').

Some scholars have posited that she may have been a counterpart of the Celtic bear goddess, Artio. On etymological grounds, the god Mercurius Artaios has also been linked to Andarta, although this has been criticised since Artaios is only attested further north in Isère.

Attestations

Andarta is attested by seven votive inscriptions, all dedicated to Dea Augusta Andarta and dated to c. 150–200 AD. These inscriptions were found in or near the town of Die (Drôme), within the territory of the Vocontii, and associate the goddess with aspects of Victory, as indicated by the epithet Augusta. Scholars generally agree that the toponym Die, later attested as Civitas Dea Vocontiorum in 333 AD, derives from the Dea element of the local tutelary goddess.

The cult of Andarta emerged at Die toward the end of the 1st century AD and subsequently spread in and around the settlement. In the late 2nd century, the cult of Cybele as the 'Great Mother of gods' was introduced in the area and experienced significant growth during the first half of the 3rd century AD. In 1912, Henri Graillot proposed that the two goddesses ultimately merged, with Andarta being hypostatized as Cybele. Benoît Rossignol, however, argues that Andarta and the Great Mother more likely coexisted within the official pantheon at Die without merging or displacing one another, in accordance with the dynamics of polytheistic religion.

References

Notes

Bibliography

• Delamarre, Xavier (2003). Dictionnaire de la langue gauloise: Une approche linguistique du vieux-celtique continental. Errance. ISBN 9782877723695.
• MacKillop, James (1998). A dictionary of Celtic mythology. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-860967-1.
• Maier, Bernhard (1997). Dictionary of Celtic Religion and Culture. Boydell & Brewer. ISBN 978-0-85115-660-6.
• Planchon, Jacques (2004). "De Luc à Die : le chassé-croisé des capitales voconces". Supplément à la Revue archéologique du centre de la France. 25 (1): 233–245.
• Prósper, Blanca María (2018). "The Venetic Inscription from Monte Manicola and Three termini publici from Padua: A Reappraisal". Journal of Indo-European Studies. 46 (1 & 2): 1–61.
• Rémy, Bernard (2010). "Les cultores dans la cité des Voconces de Die". Revue archéologique de Narbonnaise. 43 (1): 93–108. doi:10.3406/ran.2010.1801.
• Rossignol, Benoît (2022). "Autour du culte de la Mère des dieux dans la vallée du Rhône". Revue du Vivarais. CXXV-1 (829).